39 SHIFTING ALLEGIANCE
DIZZINESS SWEPT OVER Lara. A moment later, she swayed in the saddle before she caught hold of her horse’s mane to steady herself.
She wouldn’t think about what this meant. She couldn’t .
Her mouth moved then, as if to form words, yet no sound came out.
Thankfully, those around her took action. “I’m riding ahead,” Roth announced. He then gestured to the warriors behind him. “We need to catch up with the advance guard and bid them to halt. Immediately.” When Lara didn’t answer, he turned to her. “My Queen?”
She stared back at him, mute.
“Do it,” Cailean replied when Lara didn’t.
Roth nodded brusquely, gathered the reins, and dug his heels into his stallion’s sides. The beast took off, heavy hooves churning up the damp ground.
Lara watched them depart, her heart pounding.
Shouting reached them then, drifting up the column from the south.
“The Mother’s tits!” Cailean twisted in the saddle. “What the fuck is it now?”
No one answered. Instead, the shouting grew louder, angrier.
Finally, Lara found her voice. “Go and find out what the problem is,” she ordered the warriors next to her.
They did as bid, returning a short while later. The grim look on their faces made queasiness roll over her.
“The wulvers that were traveling with the rear guard have all fled,” one of them announced, his face screwing up in disgust.
“Fled?” Cailean snarled the word.
“Aye … took off into the pines. Some of the warriors gave chase, but once they got into the woods, they lost them.”
Beside Lara, Bree breathed a curse.
And meanwhile, something cold and hard settled into the pit of Lara’s belly.
“We need to get to Dulross,” Cailean said roughly. “As soon as possible.”
“Aye,” Lara agreed, forcing herself to focus. “Let’s go.”
The army moved off, traveling faster now.
The main body of it drew ahead of the lumbering wagons of the baggage train and the rear guard, their sights set upon their destination.
Sitting rigidly in the saddle as her horse cantered along the road, the tattoo of pounding hooves surrounding her, Lara stared ahead.
And all the while, her mind churned.
A short while later, they met Roth and his warriors coming back in the opposite direction. They were riding hard and had to haul their horses up sharply to avoid colliding with Cailean and the other enforcers who rode up front.
Cailean reined in his stallion, Skaal skidding to a smooth halt at his side. “Did you catch up with the wulvers?” he demanded without preamble.
Roth shook his head. His face was flushed, his gaze burning. “They must have run north as if The Reaper were chasing them,” he panted. “We followed on their heels to Dulross … but no farther.”
“No farther?” Cailean’s dark brows crashed together.
Still breathing hard, Roth cut his gaze from the chief-enforcer, instead seeking out Lara a few yards behind.
The world started to spin then, and she grabbed the pommel of the saddle. The look in his eyes was an executioner’s axe.
“The gates were barred to us. They’ve taken Dulross too.”
Climbing the wooden steps to the walls, Alar sheathed the blade he’d just cleaned.
He then headed toward the heavily muscled figure clad in leather and fur standing by the guard tower.
The warrior’s long peat-colored hair whipped around him in the wind.
Intricate knots of tattoos and bronze, silver, and gold arm rings covered his brawny arms.
“Og mac Alpin is dead,” Alar announced. “’The Brooch of Albia’ is ours.” His pulse jolted then. Finally, the jewel he and his wulvers had coveted for years—the fort that joined The Wolds and The Uplands—was theirs.
Nonetheless, the victory was bittersweet.
They’d initially planned to take more than Dulross and Doure.
The wulvers had coveted Duncrag too. Alar was supposed to have laid the groundwork for a takeover.
Instead, he’d kept his word to Lara. He’d signed that cursed document, as he’d promised, agreeing that he’d step aside when she died.
And then shortly after he’d wed Lara, he’d informed Lyall and Dolph that taking the capital was off the table.
He wouldn’t be overthrowing the High Queen.
As a result, his relationship with his brothers had been strained ever since.
Lyall and Dolph had lost trust, but Alar hoped their victory now would restore it.
Beathan mac Glen turned to face him. Streaks of woad decorated his smooth-shaven face, emphasizing the sharp blue of his eyes.
The chieftain of the Circines flashed him a hard smile before gesturing to below them, to where both hill-tribe warriors and wulvers were nailing up heavy wooden planks to reinforce the massive iron gates. “The gates are almost secured.”
“The High Queen’s army has our battering ram though,” Alar reminded him.
Aye, they’d brought Fire Wyrm north. It was being hauled by oxen in the baggage train, although there wouldn’t be any wulvers with the High Queen’s army left to wield it.
The Marav could do so, but even if they breached Dulross’s gates, they wouldn’t best the combined strength of the huge wulver and hill-tribe force within.
Beathan shrugged, nodding to where warriors were hauling iron pots up onto the top of the guardhouse.
“Just as well we’re preparing the boiling pitch.
We’ll have some fun with the shit-eaters.
” He paused then. “I must admit, I’m tempted to throw open the gates and engage them …
however, this fort is too precious to me to risk it. ”
Alar nodded, even as relief washed over him. He’d just betrayed Lara, but he was reluctant to engage her in battle. He didn’t want her to be harmed. Instead, he needed her to turn her army around and retreat to safety.
His stomach twisted then. His wife would be reeling right now. She’d be struggling to accept that he’d double-crossed her.
But he had. He’d waited decades to take territory for the wulvers, had thought about little else as the years slid by.
And yet, the past turns of the moon had caused something to shift inside him. Lara had been a distraction. From the first moment he’d seen her, fighting for her life as powries swarmed around her, she’d fascinated him. Worse than that—she’d roused a protective instinct that was difficult to quash.
He’d told himself he could handle her, and himself. He’d been determined to let nothing get between him and his goals. But she’d blunted his hunger for anything but her.
It was over now though. He’d unmasked himself.
Earlier, as they’d emerged from the broch after killing the chieftain and taking his family prisoners, both Lyall and Dolph had been jubilant.
Today changed everything for the wulvers.
For centuries, they’d been persecuted, hunted.
But now Doure and Dulross—two key forts—belonged to them.
The borderlands were theirs. Finally , they had their own slice of Albia, and allies to help them hold it.
They’d taken the fort fast, dealing easily with the garrison and any residents foolish enough to fight. Those surviving had wisely barricaded themselves inside their homes. The wulvers and hill-tribe warriors who now swarmed the narrow wynds that climbed to the broch had full control.
Dulross had been expecting the High Queen, of course, for Lara had sent a rider ahead.
The gates had been left wide open as they marched in.
Unfortunately for the fort’s residents, the Marav accompanying the wulvers weren’t the High Queen’s warriors but Circines.
The hill-tribe warriors had shifted allegiance, turning their backs on the Raven Queen—but it wasn’t the High Queen of Albia they now sided with.
“Will the bitch queen lay siege to the fort?”
Alar’s heart kicked hard as Beathan spoke once more. Hate edged the man’s voice. The chieftain of the Circines carried a grudge as deep as an Upland loch toward the rulers of Albia. His people hadn’t been treated much better than the wulvers over the centuries.
Nonetheless, Alar didn’t appreciate hearing Lara insulted. Clenching his jaw, he checked the impulse to say anything. This time.
“She’ll want to,” he answered, his gaze shifting from the chieftain to the rolling green meadows that stretched south. The wind had chased away the mist, making visibility clearer. Soon, the High Queen’s banner would appear on the horizon. “But since our force outnumbers theirs, she’ll hesitate.”
He glanced back at Beathan to see that the man’s lip had curled. He likely thought Lara was weak. He was wrong.
“I wouldn’t underestimate her, if I were you,” Alar said quietly. “The High Queen has a will of iron.” He paused for a heartbeat then. “She’s also a fire-wielder.”
Beathan’s blue eyes snapped wide, his arrogance faltering. “What?”
“Her abilities are still new to her, yet she protected the entire encampment from the Slew twice on the way here. She could cause a lot of damage.”
Nausea crept up his throat then. There it was: his wife’s secret handed over to her enemies. Such knowledge was valuable. Even so, his final betrayal of her twisted his guts.
Were there no depths to which he wouldn’t sink?
The chieftain continued to sneer, although his gaze wasn’t quite so confident. “Lucky for us, the gates are iron, not wood then,” he replied. “Although we’ll make sure not to have any braziers burning on the walls tonight.”
Alar nodded. “That would be wise.” He paused then, his stomach tightening once more. News of Lara’s secret would soon spread now. How long would it take before the rumors reached Duncrag? “I’d also have plenty of buckets of water drawn from the wells … we may need them.”
Beathan’s mouth thinned, although he nodded. Dulross’s walls were made of both stone and timber. Fire could prove their undoing. The chieftain glanced west then, the tension in his face easing a little. “It may not come to that,” he murmured. “Look.”
Turning, Alar’s attention settled upon the bank of dark clouds sitting over the tips of the southern Goatfells. The Sharp Billed Wind was blowing from that direction too, its icy teeth cutting into their flesh. Rain was on its way.
“The Hag is with us,” Beathan added, his tone smug now.
Alar didn’t reply. He wouldn’t credit The Five with any good fortune that came their way.
Nonetheless, it did look as if fate had turned against Lara mac Talorc.
It had the day he’d walked into her life. She just hadn’t known it until now. Once again, remorse knifed through him. And once again, he shoved it aside. He wouldn’t take that road.
“Ah … here she is.”
Beathan’s voice drew his attention once more, and when he looked south, he saw it—a white wolf’s head against a field of black, snapping in the wind.
It struck him as an irony then, that the Albian ruling family had the wolf as its sigil.
A dark column marched into view, spears bristling against the pale sky.
Alar’s pulse quickened. Suddenly, the image of Lara’s face that morning in the tent when she’d gazed up at him from the furs—the trust in her gaze—flashed before his eyes, unbidden.
At that moment, he’d been about to spill his guts to her, to confess all.
Thank the Hearthkeeper, they’d been interrupted. He’d been on the brink of ruining everything. Afterward, as he’d watched her kneel before the sack of rotting severed heads, he’d pulled himself together.
You can’t let her get to you . The woman had enchanted him, like a beautiful yet deadly bavaan—dancing in the moonlight before draining him of blood. He’d had a narrow escape.
Alar clenched his hands by his sides. Remember what matters. The wulvers will sing of this day for generations to come. You made it happen.
Heat ignited in his belly. The Marav deserved this.
They’d made him an outcast and hunted his wulver kin ruthlessly.
He’d lain awake at night many times over the years, imagining this moment.
It had kept him going through harsh winters and long, bitter, lonely nights.
Even when Talorc mac Brude pushed the wulvers deeper into the northern forests.
Even when the Marav cut down his brothers and sisters.
It had been his fuel. His sustenance. And it would keep him on the right path now.